


Overdoing It

by TinyFakeFanficRock



Series: The Maisie Files [4]
Category: Fallout (Video Games), Fallout: New Vegas
Genre: Alcohol, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-01-17
Updated: 2017-01-17
Packaged: 2018-09-18 03:44:38
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,213
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9366557
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/TinyFakeFanficRock/pseuds/TinyFakeFanficRock
Summary: When you're five-foot-nothing, Atomic Cocktails will really kick your ass.





	

**Author's Note:**

> Originally written for the Fallout Kink Meme.

Cass, thrilled to see evidence of Alice McLafferty and Gloria van Graff's misdeeds winging its way back to NCR, had insisted on taking Maisie and Veronica to Gomorrah to celebrate. Veronica was indulging in some vodka that already had her cheeks a little pink, but to Cass's mild exasperation, Maisie would only accept soft drinks.

"C'mon, Maisie, you're a grown-ass woman, you gotta have something stronger than sarsaparilla."

"I just don't like how alcohol tastes, Cass."

"Try an Atomic Cocktail. Doesn't even taste like booze. That's why I don't drink 'em."

"Okay, okay, fine. I'll take one sip. If I don't like it, one of you has to finish it for me."

It turned out Maisie liked Atomic Cocktails after all; once she'd downed a couple, Cass felt like broaching even more fun subjects. "So you ever gonna get laid on your own, Maisie, or should I buy you some company tonight?"

Maisie flushed. "Save your caps; I'm not interested."

"Do you actually have a sex drive, or are you as much of a little kid as you look?"

She pressed her hands to her cheeks. "Oh my God, shut the hell up."

"Just so you know, I'm taking that as a 'Yes, Cass, I am a little kid.'"

"Dammit, fine. There's this one guy I like."

"Oh, yeah?" Veronica leaned in conspiratorially. "Tell us more."

"No specifics. I don't want you all tracking him down and being all 'guess who liiiiiikes youuuu'. _Yes_ ," she said before either of them could get an objection out of their mouths, "you absolutely would. Either of you. I'll say he's got a job and he's a pretty good guy, and handsome, too. But I have no fuckin' clue if he likes me back. Fuck, I don't usually say fuck. Well, I guess I'm sayin' it now. Fuck fuck fuck fuck fuck."

Veronica giggled. "Red-haired, drunk, and cussin' up a storm. I think if we put a straw hat on you, Cass has a twin."

Cass threw back her head and cackled. "Only if you get her some stilts first."

Maisie wobbled a little when she stood up. "I don't think stilts are a very good idea right now. Also I gotta go pee."

"And _I_ gotta try one of those Atomic Cocktails," said Veronica. "I'm gonna go order up one for me and another for Maisie."

"I'll buy 'em. Maybe if we get her drunk enough she'll tell us who the mystery man is."

Maisie never did divulge her secret, but Veronica decided she liked Atomic Cocktails, too. Cass decided they were cut off once Maisie leaned way over laughing at nothing and nudged Veronica, who then fell clean off her bar stool. She sent the two of them back to the Lucky 38, figuring they couldn't get into much trouble just crossing the street.

\---

When she left Gomorrah with Veronica, Maisie was completely dazzled. Had the lights on the Strip always been this bright and colourful? And did they always move this much? It was glorious, amazing, superlative upon superlative. Drunk turned out to be _fun_!

They were weaving their way through the gyrating hookers when Veronica said, "Hey, Maisie? Y'ever heard of a ding-dong-ditch?"

"Is that another way of sayin' lesbian? Ditching the ding-dongs? Oh my God, did I just say that?"

Veronica took a moment to recover from her latest gigglefit and then said, "No. It's this thing kids used to do in the Old World, where you ring somebody's doorbell and then go hide when they come to the door, then do it again and again until they're good and annoyed. I used to do it to Ramos until he said he'd shove his Gauss rifle up my ass if I did it again."

"Ow."

"No kidding. Never wanted to see if he meant it. But anyway, what if ... what if we ding-dong-ditched the Lucky 38?"

Had Veronica always been this brilliant? "You're crazy. I love you. Let's do this."

They tottered over to the side of the casino, Veronica listing badly to the right, possibly because she kept forgetting about the power fist she'd put back on as soon as it was returned, and took cover behind one of the red tapered walls.

"I'll ring the bell," said Maisie.

"Hey, I thought this up. How come you getta go first?"

"'Cause I can stand up better'n you right now."

"Well, if you're gonna be like _that_ about it ..."

Maisie put up her index finger, closed one eye for accuracy, and carefully beeped Veronica's nose. "C'mon, it's no fun if you're all mad."

"I'm not even mad. You're just really drunk."

"This from the girl who can't compensate for the weight of her power fist."

"It's just a minor gravity problem. Gravity is pulling too hard on that hand. Probably because it likes shiny things."

"Gravity likes shiny things. I fuckin' love you."

"You keep saying that and we're gonna end up at the NCR records office, y'know."

Maisie snorted, rang the Lucky 38's doorbell, and scampered unsteadily back around to the side of the building, where she and Veronica tried to smother their giggles as Victor opened the door.

"Well, howdy, pardn-- huh. Musta missed 'em." Victor turned and wheeled back inside.

"'Kay, 'kay, your turn now." Maisie nudged Veronica toward the door; she wobbled over, poked the doorbell with a clank, and scurried back to Maisie's hiding spot.

Once again, Victor opened the door scanned the area. "Well, howdy, pardn-- huh. Still nobody here."

They were clinging to each other now, nearly vibrating with the power of their not-very-well-suppressed laughter. "Do it again!" said Veronica, starting Maisie on her way with a shove on the shoulder.

This gave Maisie a gravity problem of her own; she stumbled and scraped her chin on the 38's steps, but recovered quickly and scrambled to the bell and back.

"Well, howdy, pardn-- aw, shucks, I was sure I heard the bell that time!" Victor was actually starting to sound a little frustrated. "I better get m'self checked for bugs again."

They were huddled behind the hulk of a blue bus nearby, laughing themselves well into wheezing, when a Securitron wheeled up to them, its monitor portrait unchanged, but its voice very different.

"Misses Sutton and Santangelo," Mr. House said, his voice distorted by the tinny speaker but still plainly irritated, "you do realize this ancient prank of yours becomes particularly pointless in light of my surveillance network?"

Maisie froze, trying to get her brain to come up with an intelligent response. It settled for "Oh. Um. Right. Damn."

"Report to me when you stop speaking in monosyllables." The Securitron wheeled off without waiting for a reply.

"Oooooooh, shomebody's in trou- _ble_." Judging by the trouble Veronica was having with pronouncing her _s_ 's, that last Atomic Cocktail had just kicked in.

"Shaddup. Look, so this prank's not gonna work on the Strip 'cause it's fulla Securitrons and they can all see us and shit."

"Then we just gotta go where the Shecuritronsh aren't."

"I don't think we should try Freeside right now."

"But for once we'd fit right in!"

"You really wanna put up with the Kings trynna turn you straight with the power of their fancy jackets?"

"'Kay. Point. But if we're stuck on the Strip, the Shecuri -- the robots're gonna wreck it."

"You know, there's a spot on the Strip where the Securitrons aren't in charge."

"Ohmigawd, do you mean --"

"Yup! The NCR Embassy. They won't know what hit 'em! Er, their doorbell."

They stopped on the way to the Embassy to join a splash fight in the Ultra-Luxe's fountain until the Securitrons' shooing ruined that, too.

They staggered cheerfully on to the NCR's compound, where they located a hiding spot without drawing any suspicion whatsoever. They were just that good at sneaking.

Veronica launched herself at the doorbell while Maisie scurried for cover behind one of the large planters nearby, chortling helplessly all the while. When she returned, she whispered, "Take _that_ , NSheeR," and that just made everything five times funnier.

The troopers didn't seem to agree. Maisie and Veronica tried several times, but no one seemed to find their disappearing act anywhere near as amusing as they did. It was tragic, really. Not quite tragic enough to stop them from giggling every time, but still, there was pathos there. Probably Arcade knew a Latin poem that would describe it.

Captain Pappas herself came to the door the fifth time, which made perfect sense: It probably _did_ take an officer to truly appreciate their revival of the noble Pre-War art of the ding-dong-ditch. "Ladies, I can see you behind those planters. More than that, I can hear you laughing. Knock it the hell off. I'm starting to get pissed."

When confronted with sternness like that, the only reasonable course of action was to laugh and ring the doorbell some more until Captain Pappas dragged them out from behind the planters with one hand in Maisie's collar and the other in Veronica's hood.

"If you two don't stop wasting my time, I'm gonna --"

"Gonna what? Gonna tell us to shtop again? You can't shoot her, she'sh the Courier!" And then Veronica pitched forward and threw up all over Captain Pappas.

Maisie was lucky enough to black out at that point.

When Maisie woke up the first time, she looked around only long enough to find a bucket to throw up into, then wiped her mouth on her sleeve and curled up in a ball to hide from her throbbing headache and the ridiculously bright lights.

When she woke up the second time, her head still hurt and the world was still way too loud and bright, but she could at least start processing her surroundings: Pitted ceiling above her, cracked tile floor below her. The only furnishings were metal benches, one of which she'd been sleeping on, embedding its pattern onto the arm she'd used as a pillow. There was a green lump in the near corner.

"Veronica?" Maisie said to the lump. "Where are we? This is so not the 38."

"I don't care. Just let me die in peace," was all Veronica said before she went back to pressing her head against the -- bars?

Then all the pieces clicked into place. This was the NCR MP headquarters, and they were in the cells. Why were they in the -- oh. Oh, _right_. The events of the previous evening were starting to come back to her, rolling in on a cloud of shame. _Shiiiiiiiiiit_. Those damn Atomic Cocktails had been an even bigger mistake than she'd initially thought. Drunk turned out to be not fun at _all_.

"Aww, man, turns out they call 'em cocktails 'cause they fuck you in the ass." Maisie wanted to be taken aback by her own vulgarity, but instead decided she could clean up her language when her head hurt less.

She thought going home to her own bed might be a good start on getting rid of the headache. "Hey, um, 'scuse me," she said to the trooper standing guard, "can we go now? My friend and I are definitely really sorry and we'd just like to go home and never ever do anything remotely like this ever again."

He shrugged. "You'll have to talk to the captain about that, kid."

They listened to Veronica snore for about an hour before Captain Pappas put in an appearance. "Heard you wanted to talk. Make it quick."

"So, uh, about last night? I'm really sorry about all that."

The captain was clearly unmoved. "You should be."

"It won't happen again."

"It had damn better not."

"No, seriously, ma'am, I swear I'm never drinking again." Maisie had never felt so certain about anything before and hoped that her sincere conviction was showing.

If it was, Captain Pappas gave no sign of it. "If I had a cap for every time I heard _that_ one, I wouldn't be getting puked on by drunks."

"Could you let us out, please, ma'am?"

"I was going to say 'hell no,' but the 'ma'am' is a nice touch. Maybe later."

Maisie spent the next hour and a half after that contemplating the wisdom of teetotaling, and then another trooper came by with a familiar face in tow. "It's your lucky day, kid," she said as she unlocked the cell. "Your brother came to bail you two out."

"Boone! C'mon, Veronica, we're going home." She shook her friend awake and then hurtled out to give Boone a huge hug. "Thank you for coming to get me."

"Actually, I came to get Veronica, but they said I had to take you both. Now get off me. You stink."

"I love you, too, big brother."

As they waited for the elevator in the Lucky 38, Boone finally asked, "Do I even wanna know what you were in for?"

They told him, only getting into a few arguments along the way about who had thought up what.

At the end, he actually chuckled. "Wow. You get _dumb_ when you drink."

As true as this obviously was, Maisie still felt compelled to defend herself. "You wouldn'ta thought it was stupid if we'd done it at the Fort and started shooting when the Legion opened up."

"... well now, that's different."


End file.
